Navigator 6.4 alpha 1 is out -- mouse functions much better, and fixed Save All

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geoffcanyon
Posts: 53
Joined: Thu Aug 15, 2013 9:25 am

Navigator 6.4 alpha 1 is out -- mouse functions much better, and fixed Save All

Post by geoffcanyon » Mon Sep 24, 2018 11:15 pm

As usual, you can get Navigator here. Or grab it from GitHub.

Phew! I discovered a brutal bug in Navigator while coding this update. Everyone should either update, or avoid the "Save All" and "Save Stackfiles" popup menu options. The code that iterated over the stackFiles of a stack to save them all didn't have a test for existence, and thus if any stackFiles were deleted, but still in the stackFiles property of the stack being saved, then the loop would die (silently, because of the "rev" prefix) and not save the remaining stackFiles. I have no idea how I managed to work on Navigator for the past eight months, using this feature *all the time*, and not run into this before. But in this case, I ended up having to code -- and lose -- the functionality listed below *twice* before I twigged to what was happening. :-(

In any case, the "Save All" function now checks for existence on each stack before attempting to do anything with it, and if any are missing, will offer to update the stackFiles property to remove the ones that are missing.

As an aside, does the IDE have any sort of equivalent function? i.e. "run through the stackFiles of this stack and save them all"?

NEW FEATURES

The "Edit Colors" option on the popup menu now works -- it worked before on the Properties menu.

Completely reworked the mouse-targeting options:
-- Choose Color
-- Stack menu -> the mouseStack
-- Action menu -> Bookmark -> MouseControl

You no longer need to hold down the option key while using these commands -- I believe this made these functions useless under Linux, as well as making them harder to use in general. Instead, as soon as you trigger the command, Navigator displays a cross-hair. Mouse over the color/control/stack you want to select, and click, and the selection is done.

Updated the mouseStack command so that when Navigator displays the current card of the stack you select, the control the crosshair was over when you made the selection is hilited in Navigator's list. This has been an awesome feature for me, I hope it delights you as well, and I'm looking to further enhance this.

Fixed (I believe) an error where sometimes Navigator would think that it was still dragging even after the mouse is up. It was tricky to get this to happen, so we'll see...

Fixed an error in the placement of the drag and drop controls when dragging from one Navigator to another. This had previously been fixed for dragging within Navigator, but I just found the remaining issue.

Improved Navigator's handling of hilites when cloning, deleting, and dragging and dropping, but it's by no means perfect yet. There was an issue where Navigator's record of what lines are hilited wouldn't be updated after cloning or deleting controls. This could lead to weird dragging responses, and this has now been fixed.

Also, you should find that when dragging a control, hilites are retained *as long as the control's long id doesn't change*. This means dragging controls into or out of groups breaks this functionality. I'm not 100% sure that I haven't made some aspects worse at the same time as fixing others -- drag and drop is the bane of my existence -- but I'll compare to what I had a week ago and take the best of both if possible.

geoffcanyon
Posts: 53
Joined: Thu Aug 15, 2013 9:25 am

Re: Navigator 6.4 alpha 1 is out -- mouse functions much better, and fixed Save All

Post by geoffcanyon » Tue Sep 25, 2018 5:19 am

I forgot -- I also added in-line editing of properties identified as single-line in Navigator's property editor. Meaning:

1. If the property is "colors" (this would only be displayed if you add colors to the control's properties in Navigator's preferences dialog) then Navigator will immediately open the color editor.
2. If the property is true/false, it will simply toggle between those two values.
3. If the property has a defined set of values (the style of a button, for example) then the list of styles will pop up for you to select. If I have missed any of these in Navigator's configuration, let me know.
4. If the property is defined as single-line in Navigator's configuration, it will edit in-line in the property editor. This is also a configuration in Navigator, so if I have missed any of these, let me know.
5. If none of the above apply, the standard Navigator editor window will open.

gc

geoffcanyon
Posts: 53
Joined: Thu Aug 15, 2013 9:25 am

Re: Navigator 6.4 alpha 1 is out -- mouse functions much better, and fixed Save All

Post by geoffcanyon » Tue Sep 25, 2018 5:21 am

I checked, and apparently I had an optimistic impression of how Navigator used to handle the highlighted lines when dragging and dropping. I didn't find a version with any retention of highlighting at all. So while there's still room for improvement, what I have now is better than before.

bogs
Posts: 5435
Joined: Sat Feb 25, 2017 10:45 pm

Re: Navigator 6.4 alpha 1 is out -- mouse functions much better, and fixed Save All

Post by bogs » Tue Sep 25, 2018 6:16 pm

I find it amazing how far you've brought this along since 2.5 Image
Image

geoffcanyon
Posts: 53
Joined: Thu Aug 15, 2013 9:25 am

Re: Navigator 6.4 alpha 1 is out -- mouse functions much better, and fixed Save All

Post by geoffcanyon » Sat Sep 29, 2018 6:26 pm

Thanks! Apparently a message needs 10 characters, so thanks a lot!

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